The Dip — Book Notes

The most important message of this book is about knowing when to quit.

When you're in a dip on the path toward success, treat the dip as an opportunity. The logic is simple: everyone wants to succeed, and the long, tedious stretch of a dip is exactly what filters out the competition.

But if you're on a cliff or a downward slope heading toward failure, get away as fast as you can. Conserving your resources lets you focus more on what actually matters.

A woodpecker tapping every tree twenty times — five hundred trees — accomplishes nothing. It just exhausts itself.

Quitting is therefore far better than sheer stubbornness. Quitting gives us the chance to do other things better.

Make sure your progress is measurable — reference the SMART principle. A job is just a tactic, a means to get what you want. Once a job hits a dead end, quitting that job to move toward a larger market is entirely rational.